OK, I got the wiring diagram here for the cap that I bought (got a pretty good deal on it and might go down there and pick up one of their high lift farm jacks for 20$) and it just doesn't seem right to me. I dunno. Right now I got two amps, a crossover and a line driver that I need to hook up. I bought a (1) 4awg to (4) 8awg distribution block and a (1) 4awg to (4) 8awg fused distribution block.
Here's the diagram. I'll probably sit here and make a wiring diagram for my system since its raining outside and I can't work on the install and I'm still waiting on my fused distribution block to get here from NY.

 

The cap should go right before the amp.

 

Well I got two options.
Option 1

Option 2

I'm probably going to get my buddy to come over tomorrow and give me a hand with that part of the wiring. I've wired several systems just never a cap.

 

Here is some info on wiring in Capacitors: http://www.precisionautosound.net/capacitors.html

Hope this helps.

 

yeah that made it alot clearer.

 

be very careful with Caps, if you wire them wrong they will EXPLODE!

 

Hence the reason why I'm asking a second opinion before I wire it. I want to make sure that it is correct.

So I'm assuming that Option 2 is correct.

 

I think Splitz is referring to this diagram:


That diagram is "wrong" and "dangerous" because the poles of the cap aren't identified.

The caps we're talking about here are called "electrolytic" and they are polarized (like a battery). They're designed to have current flow through them in only one direction. If you hook up the positive side ("+" or RED) to a ground ("-" or BLACK) and vice-versa, the cap will explode, and in a cap this size, it's gonna be loud and dangerous.

So, that diagram will be more "correct" (100% correct in fact) if if looked like this:




It depends on how technical you want to get. Option 2 is much more correct than Option 1. But, it's can be read "wrong" and thus create the potential for a problem.

In the commercial pro-audio world (i.e., recording studios) it's generally considered a HUGE no-no to ever tie grounds together and then extend them to reach the actual earth ground.

In "Option 2" it can be read that you should tie the ground from the amp to the negative side of the cap through a junction box, and then extend that with a single wire to the actual grounding point. That would be considered "wrong". Each device that needs a ground should have it's own dedicated ground, preferably terminated at the same point. Which in the case would be the same bolt on the car's frame.

If you don't do this, then you're creating two situations for failure. 1) The single wire tying the two pieces to ground can fail and all devices will lose their ground at once. 2) You create the possibility of a "ground loop" which will show up in your speakers as hum. This will come from where some of the current will start to flow between the devices themselves and _NOT_ through the common ground since the path between the devices has less resistance than that to ground.

In my opinion, this is the right way to show "Option 2":



Hope that helps.

 

Ive got mine wired like mark shows in that last pic and it works fine.

 

Cool Cool, I appreciate all the help. I think I'll wire it that way and just dedicate a ground to the cap. My other devices I'm going to try the ground block I got because it would be a pain to try to wire 6 different grounds to one bolt. If I get line noise then I'll do the above.

 

As I'm sure you've gotten from everyone above installing a Cap is something you do carefully. Back when I had 2 1 Farad Caps I used this site to refrence from.

The most important part which I haven't seen mentioned yet is the "charging" of the capactior. It is covered on the webpage and is very important.

 

krash-

I have only read your original post but will add my 2 cents.

Simply put:

battery to d-block, d-block to cap, cap to amp

obviously the line driver is a seperate component

everyone is going to have their own opinions on whether to chassis ground your caps and amps or run them in parallel with one another. i am running 6 amps drawing over 7000 watts and 750+ amperage. batcaps have been my solution, as well as 3 dry/gel cells, and a larger alt. if you run batcaps be sure to run them in parallel and have your only chassis ground be your original ground at the battery.

hope this helps...i am not a huge fan of d-blocks, but i am also an audio idiot who doesnt know when to stop...hopefully you have all of this solved by now. good luck.

Billy

 

Yeah I installed everything minus the cap for now. Its mounted just not hooked up at the moment. Nothing cuts out and the amps surprisingly don't get hot. Its fairly nice. I might not need the cap. I'll test it again on the way to work but I don't think the amps are going to cause too much problems. I'll hook up the amps after I get back from camping ( http://www.cavemanexperience.com ). I got a 4 hour drive and wanted everything installed before I leave.

EDIT: If I get a chance I'll take pics tomorrow.

 

The info on charging the cap is awesome! My friend and I missed that when we hooked his up. Poor cap .

 

actually, they will make a lot of sparks.

true story:

circa mid 90s during CES. richard clark (google his name along with "car audio") stuck a 1 farad cap into his pants. cap is fully charged. he then shorted the leads of the cap. lots of sparks. even more screams from audience.

ask him today how that went...

 

i would recommend installing the cap even if you think you wont need it. Your battery will thank you for it in the long run.

 

Shorting the leads of the cap and installing it backwards are 2 completely different things. if you short the leads they will arc. if you install backwards they can blow up. In school we did a lab with the professor and he took a very little cap like a 15v 100uf cap put it under a box (cardboard) and then ran it up backwards with a power supply and it blew a hole in the side of the box the size of a tennis ball. so if you make a really big mistake and you blow a 1 farad cap up in your vehicle, you wont have a vehicle left.
Just my thoughts on the matter.
BIGMOOI